Prologue
DERBYSHIRE, ENGLAND - 1812
Unfortunately,Fitzwilliam Darcy was long dead.
He was not “dead and gone,” two words which were often linked together. It was more like “dead and hovering,” because his bruised soul sort of hovered above his little chunk of the world, completely bewildered by a very important question:
Why did nobody realise that he had died? Or, at least, that something was very, very wrong?
His lifeless husk of a body was still busy doing all the things: getting up in the morning, dressing in riding clothes, and after his ride submitting to his valet for a comprehensive cleaning/grooming/dressing routine. Then his empty body went on with daily routines: eating meals, meeting with his steward, dealing with correspondence, and (minimally) interacting with his much younger sister.
And nobody seemed to realise that there was anything deficient with the simulacrum that went through all those motions of his former life.
Not one person asked, “Are you well, sir?” or “Is something wrong, Brother?”
Obviously, nobody was going to ask, “Are you dead, sir?” because that soulless body was so capable of following routines and even fulfilling demands. But…surely he had been more lifelike, before…surely he had sometimes met with friends and laughed at nonsense and smiled at his sister.
Before…there was a time before—it felt like a long time ago—when he had thought himself to be an honourable man, a gentleman. However, a certain young lady had blasted those pretensions. Her words had seemed overly harsh at first, and he had scribbled a vigorous defence and, against all propriety, put his letter directly into her hand, begging her to read it. That had been his last act before his soul detached from his body and began to hover.
—Before he had begun to hover and wonder why nobody was scratching their heads over the changes that had occurred. Was he always truly as taciturn and solemn—nay, as silent and grim—as he now observed from his outside perspective?
Then, after an eternity of hovering and wondering, something happened.
Something that caused his soul to suck right back into his body, where it belonged.
Thesomethingthat happened was another encounter with Miss Elizabeth Bennet.
One
“Elizabeth!”Darcy cried.
His startled use of her Christian name evoked several gasps—one of which escaped his love’s beautiful lips.
He bowed to Miss Elizabeth, feeling thankful that manners could kick in so automatically after being in limbo for so long, even as he hurried to correct his error. “Excuse me—Miss Elizabeth Bennet! How wonderful it is to see you here…” Darcy paused for an instant, wondering where he was. He flicked his eyes around and was shocked with the familiarity of the location—he was standing in the bakery of Lambton, the market town nearest to Pemberley—but also the strangeness of the location—as master of the largest estate in the area, and one of the largest landowners in all of Derbyshire, it was surely unusual for him to be running errands. The moment over, he hurried to complete his sentence: “…in Lambton!”
Darcy felt so warm, having just been reunited with his body, and he deliberately tried to make certain that this warmth was on clear display in his voice and eyes. A moment after he finished speaking, he thought to smile. Darcy wanted to make certain that he was not acting like the arrogant man who hadlived before that lengthy period of out-of-body existence, and he certainly wanted to ensure he was acting more friendly than the dour simulacrum he had watched for all those days, months, years.
His effort at warmth was rewarded by a shift in Elizabeth’s expression. She had looked as shocked as he was, at first, but upon his words, she maintained the wide eyes and lifted eyebrows of the very surprised, but her mouth curved in a small smile as she said, “Mr Darcy!”
The next thing he had to know waswhenhe had found himself resurrected, or at least reanimated. How many years had it been since those fateful two days in Hunsford—the day he had made his horrifically worded proposal of marriage to Elizabeth, and had been rightfully and soundly rejected, and the next day, when he had pressed a letter into her hand?—?
It could not have been decades since then. Elizabeth did not look any older. Her skin was not only still firm and unlined, it radiated youth and vigour. From what he could tell from the curls peeping out of her bonnet, her hair was as dark and shiny, with those same gold-copper-bronze highlights, as it was the day he had proposed. Her eyes were as glowing and sparkling, and her body—oh, God, her body was as luscious as ever.
He tentatively asked, “How long has it been since…?”
He did not know how to complete that sentence, so he just allowed it to hang in the air.
When she began to answer with the words, “Thirty-two,” he felt staggered. Thirty-two years, and she still looked twenty years old?
Perhaps in the face of his obvious surprise, she blushed. He had rarely seen Elizabeth blush, and he now realised that it made her beauty, somehow, exponentially more alluring.
Without missing a beat, she finished her answer to the question of how long it had been…since…. And, it turned out, it was not thirty-twoyears, but instead thirty-twodays!
Only a day or two longer than a month??? How was that even possible?
Still blushing, Elizabeth smiled more widely, and she lifted one eyebrow. This expression nearly always presaged a tease, and Darcy adored her teasing, and that particular smile, and that specific eyebrow-lift. She added, “Plus four hours.”
He had pressed that letter into her hands at around seven in the morning, and it was now nearing noon, he estimated by the angle of the rays of sunlight entering the shop windows. He noted the exactitude of her original answer—she had not said “a month” or “around a month,” which would have been quite an ordinary answer to the query of how long it had been since two people had seen one another. Instead, she knew the exact number of days. That seemed to indicate…that the proposal, and perhaps the letter, had really impacted her. Maybe, even, that she cared…?
